


soldier blue

by dancinghopper



Series: the stephanie hyde cinematic universe [1]
Category: That '70s Show
Genre: F/F, for something set in the 70s that should be riddled with homophobia this is.......... not, this is without doubt the most self indulgent thing i’ve ever written
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-15
Updated: 2019-06-14
Packaged: 2019-07-12 12:16:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15995042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dancinghopper/pseuds/dancinghopper
Summary: me: i don’t write for t7s anymoreme to me: lesbian jackie/hyde au





	1. part one

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im sure at least oNE other person has had this thought. this is for u
> 
> (quick note: hyde is noticeably less white-passing in this than in the show, but it doesn’t come up too much)

**i.**

Hyde picks at her nails, carefully scratching the polish from her thumb. It helps, gives her something to focus on that’s not the light streaming through Donna’s hair, or the curve of her jeans. When she looks up, Jackie is staring at her. She raises one defiant eyebrow in her direction, taking pleasure when Jackie turns away.

Forman slides his hand into the small of Donna’s back. He’s been doing that a lot, recently. Like he wants to remind himself that Donna’s real, and he really is dating the girl he’s been in love with since he was six. Hyde wishes it didn’t make her stomach turn.

She also wishes that Jackie would stop trying to fit in, because she’s sure that’s what possesses her to insist on repainting Hyde’s nails. She agrees, but only because the alternative is watching Donna and Eric make cow-eyes at each other. Predictably, it doesn’t take long for Jackie to bring it up, because Jackie’s a cheerleader and apparently that’s what they do.

“So,” she says, swiping on some more neon-green polish. It seems very out of place in Jackie’s pink room, and Hyde wonders if she bought it specially. “Are you, like, in love with Eric, or something?”

There isn’t a second where Hyde contemplates telling her. She just grunts and avoids Jackie’s eyes. “No.”

Jackie’s hands slow, like she’s working up the courage to say something but doesn’t want Hyde to know that’s what she’s doing. “...Donna?”

It’s kind of weird, in retrospect, that Jackie even thought of that option. Doesn’t change Hyde’s mind, though. “No.”

Jackie sighs. “You’re being very annoying.”

Hyde sends her a shit-eating grin. “Kind of my thing, doll.”

She can’t tell because of all the  _pink_  in the room, but she thinks Jackie blushes.

***

It becomes a thing. It shouldn’t, not really - Hyde’s never hung round with girls, always the guys. It’s mostly a rebellion thing, but partly also because none of the other girls seemed keen on wrestling with her in the mud, bar Donna. Even if it wasn’t a guy/girl thing (and Hyde’s not trying to make it one, because traditional gender roles aren’t very punk at all), Hyde should absolutely hate Jackie’s guts.

And she does. Kind of.

It’s just harder than she expected, because even though Jackie’s valley girl voice is grating and even though she only ever talks about her nails and Pam Macey and who’s sleeping with who, it’s kind of funny to see Kelso bend over backwards for her. She keeps insisting on buying Hyde food, as well, and she’s never been one to turn down a free meal. Once she even offered to have Hyde’s favourite leather jacket dry-cleaned, and that was sort of nice of her.

Sometimes Jackie doesn’t even talk to her, just hums little tunes as she paints Hyde’s nails, and Hyde can admit to herself that that’s not half bad.

She likes Jackie, but she wont miss her when she’s gone.

***

“Wow,” says Hyde, her mouth moving of its own accord, as she finally acknowledges Jackie’s presence. “You look beautiful.”

She flushes, instantly, but Jackie just beams at her. “Oh my god, so do you! I wasn’t even aware you knew what dresses were.”

“Har har,” grumbles Hyde, and tugs on her sleeves. Her feet already hurt from the heels. “It’s prom. I’m an anarchist, but I’m not completely dense.”

Jackie looks at her strangely. “I never said you were.”

Hyde wonders, briefly, if this is what Jackie is really like underneath all the money and the cheerleading and the disco. It’s certainly weird that Jackie’s agreed to go to the prom stag. She wonders if maybe that’s just how Jackie’s chosen to defend herself - Hyde chose eyeliner and sex and smoking pot, and Jackie’s carving her way out from the inside. It’s kind of a weird thought.

“C’mon,” she mumbles, and gestures towards Jackie’s car, surprised when Jackie reaches up to grab her wrist.

Both of them stare at their connected hands. Jackie’s bottom lip trembles.

“I - thank you for tonight, Stephanie.” Nobody calls her Stephanie but Mrs Forman. “It means a lot to me.”

Hyde blinks. “Oh. Let’s, uh. Let’s not do that.”

Jackie frowns at her in confusion.

“Feelings. After tonight we’re going back to hating each other.”

Jackie drops her hand, rolling her eyes. “Fine.”

And, shit, that wasn’t what she wanted to do. She reminds herself that Jackie’s young and fragile and dumb, and kicks at a bit of gravel.

“Wait,” she says, and Jackie turns around. She really does look very pretty. Hyde sighs. “If you won’t call me Hyde then at least... at least call me Steph. I’ve always hated Stephanie.”

Jackie stares at her, and then shrugs. “Okay. You wanna drive, Steph?”

Hyde smirks. “You got insurance?”

Jackie blinks, the hand extending her keys pausing mid-air.

“I’m just kidding,” says Hyde, taking the keys. Jackie relaxes. “I don’t care if you have or not.”

***

“You’re gonna have a girl in the house? Permanently?”

Hyde takes a lot of pleasure in the fact that her and Forman hit Kelso simultaneously, and even more when he yells and jumps back.

“Damn, guys!” he whines, hugging himself as he attempts to grab both points of injury. “What was that for?”

“For insinuating Forman and me can’t live together because we’re eventually bound to sleep together, you moron.”

Forman nods. “Yeah, Kelso, c’mon. Hyde’s Hyde. She’s like Laurie, if Laurie were cool and smoked pot.”

“Thanks, man,” says Hyde, the warmth in her chest Kelso had temporarily driven away returning. She’s going to live with the Formans. Holy shit.

“That’s exactly what I mean!”

Hyde rolls her eyes. “Kelso, would you fuck me?”

He opens his mouth, then shuts it again, looking flabbergasted.

She smirks. “That’s what I thought.”

Kelso stares at her some more. “But you’re... but you’re a chick!”

“Yeah,” says Forman, slowly, and claps Kelso on the shoulder, “but she’s also the chick who knows about the time you crapped your pants at-“

Kelso slaps his hand across Forman’s mouth. “Shut up,  _Eric_!”

Hyde laughs.

***

Kelso and Jackie eventually do split, for real this time, and that’s one hell of a relief, because recently whenever Jackie talks all Hyde wants to do is rip her own arm off and throw it at her. It’s got nothing to do with the fact that whenever she speaks recently it’s to talk about  _Michael_. Hyde doesn’t give a crap about their relationship. Admittedly it does mean she has to go back to doing her own nails, but she’s sure she’ll survive. So what if the only colour she has is black, and none of the funky ones Jackie has? It’ll be fine.

With this is mind, Hyde’s all set to go back to relative peace and quiet, before she realises that Jackie’s still  _here_.

“I think,” says Jackie, as she kicks her feet against the dryer like a little kid, “that if I left you’d really miss me.”

Hyde doesn’t say anything.

“Right?”

“Sure.”

Jackie whacks her arm, disrupting her laundry folding. Hyde sighs.

“I... suppose,” she says, looking down at Forman’s t-shirts and not the girl in front of her, “That it’s important... when you have a, uh... bad breakup.... that you have friends... for... support... and... stuff...”

Jackie beams. “Right! So let’s go to the mall!”

“Woah.” Hyde takes a step back. “I meant friends like Donna. Or, not me.”

Jackie rolls her eyes. “But you’re so different to them! Donna just ends up relating it back to Eric, you actually give good advice.”

Hyde deploys option 3 of her  _how to avoid Jackie Burkhart_  strategies _,_ and leaves. Jackie’s whines follow her back to her bedroom.

“It’s just that I noticed you’re alone a lot, and now I’m alone too. So let’s be alone together!”

“Look,” she says proudly, and when Hyde turns round Jackie is standing confidently with her hands on her hips. “We’re alone right now!”

Hyde has some highly unexpected (and highly inappropriate) thoughts. She blinks, then pushes past her and heads back to the safety of public spaces, trying to clear her head and not think about Jackie’s lips or her eyes or how good she looks amongst Hyde’s stuff. “That’s not really a good reason for us to....”

“ _Stephanieeeeeeee_ ,” pouts Jackie, and Hyde wishes it were half as endearing. “Let’s go to Sizzler. They’ve got a salad bar? And five different colours of Jello.”

Hyde frowns.

“I’ll buy.”

“You’ve been through a rough time,” she concedes. “Let’s go, kid.”

***

“Those boots look really nice on you,” compliments Jackie as they get back into her car. Hyde looks down at her feet, biting back a smile.

“Jackie, you buying me boots is just plain wrong.”

She lets the smile come out in full force as she teases her: “Shoulda let me shoplift them.”

Jackie grins back. “Please. There’s no way you could have gotten past that shop assistant.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah,” says Jackie, flicking down her visor. “She had her eyes trained on you the second you walked in.”

“‘Cause I’m hot,” quips Hyde, looking away while Jackie fixes her lipstick. The other girl huffs.

“Because you  _look_  like a shoplifter. Me? I’m just a well-behaved, rich girl with daddy’s credit card. Nobody would look twice at me!”

“That doesn’t sound like something you’d usually brag about, but I agree.”

“Oh har har,” grumbles Jackie, slapping Hyde’s arm lightly. “You wanna go home?”

Hyde bites her lip, something in her heart twinging. “Nah. Let’s go get burgers, or something. You need to eat more.”

Jackie looks pleased. “Okay.”

She puts the keys in the ignition but doesn’t turn them. Her other hand fidgets on the steering wheel. “I - thank you for hanging out with me.”

The words are accompanied by a bright blush. “I know... I know you didn’t really want to, but, thank you. Today was very special.”

The twinging in Hyde’s heart strengthens, but she tries to downplay it and not think about the fact that Jackie seems to thank her a lot for doing the bare minimum. “It’s cool.”

She taps Jackie’s bicep lightly with her knuckles. “You know, you’re kinda fun to hang with, when you’re not being annoying.”

The smile Jackie gives her could light up the night sky. She takes her hand off the ignition, and turns to face Hyde. Hyde looks back at her, and there’s something there, something she can’t quite -

Jackie bites her lip, and leans in.

Hyde panics.

She jolts back as far as she can go, her back connecting with the window with a loud  _thud_. Jackie’s expression rapidly turns to hurt.

“Woah,” says Hyde, panic flaring in her chest, and her cheeks on fire. “Nuh uh. I don’t do hugs. You want that, go find a new boyfriend.”

Jackie stares at her, and then whatever is lingering in her eyes fades, and she huffs. “You suck.”

“Anything for you, doll.”

It doesn’t really make sense, but Jackie smiles anyway.

**ii.**

“Hey Stephanie!”

Hyde rolls her eyes behind her sunglasses. She knows her and Jackie are friends, okay? She might not be past acknowledging that it’s not  _just_  because she feels she should support Jackie through her and Kelso’s breakup, but she knows they’re friends. She’s made her peace with that. But holy shit, the girl is persistent.

“Hi Jackie. Roller disco let up early?”

Jackie giggles.

“You’re so funny!” she coos around a blush, and Hyde feels a warning prickle dance across her neck. “But wrong, I brought you a gift!”

She presents Hyde with a paper bag, who takes it wearily. “You shouldn’t have.”

“Look inside.”

Hyde does. Nearly dies of exasperation right then and there.

“Is this -?”

“Oh yeah.” Jackie puffs up her chest. “I brought it. In the ghetto.”

Hyde raises her eyebrow.

“Fine, so I got it off my house keeper, so what? You shouldn’t be ungrateful.”

Hyde sighs, and tosses the bag onto a nearby car out the back of The Hub. She folds her arms. “What’s going on, Jackie?”

“What do you mean?”

Hyde waves a hand in her direction. “The... this. Hanging out with me. Buying pot. Kelso dumps you and you decide you wanna be a burnout, or something?”

Jackie’s face hardens. “Michael didn’t dump me. And that’s not what this is. I just...”

She shuffles on her feet a little, looking embarrassed. “You’ve just been so nice to me, and I wanted to show you that I’m not a square cheerleader.”

“Jackie. You  _are_  a square cheerleader. There’s nothing wrong with that, man. But you gotta stop using me to replace that Kelso shaped hole in your life, or whatever.”

“No! No,” says Jackie, panic in her voice. She puts two hands up like she would to steady one of her horses. “No, Hyde, that’s not what this is, I swear. I just... I just think you’re like the coolest, sweetest girl I’ve ever met.”

 _What the fuck?_  Hyde knew it would happen eventually, but Jackie’s hot rollers have finally given her permanent brain damage.

“No you  _don’t_!”

“ _Yes_ , I do!”

“Is everything okay here?”

Hyde panics. It’s a cop, because of course it is. She’s suddenly acutely aware of the bag of pot.

“Yeah,” she says, immediately dropping her aggressive posture. She tries to school her face into one of neutrality, and keeps her hands loose at her sides - hands in pockets make you look shifty, or that’s what she’s heard. “Yeah, everything’s fine, right Jackie?”

“There’s nothing in the bag!”

Hyde’s gonna kill her. The cop stares at them warily, and then moves to inspect the bag. He scoffs, and gestures at Jackie.

“Ok, Miss. You’re gonna have to come with me.”

Jackie’s lips fall open, pink rising in her cheeks. “Oh - no, no, I can _not_  go to jail. I have to  _cheer_  tomorrow!”

The cop rolls his eyes, and grabs her elbow. Something in Hyde’s chest starts sending alarm bells through her body. Jackie’s too small, she’s too innocent, she can’t defend herself -

“Hey.”

She pushes herself between them. “What’re you doing, man? The bag is mine.”

She keeps her eyes focused on the cop, and not on the way Jackie snaps her head to look at her.

“C’mon,” she says, when the cop visibly hesitates. “Cheerleader, mixed kid. It ain’t rocket science.”

The cop shrugs, moustache twitching downwards. He lets go of Jackie’s arm, and a small part of Hyde unclenches. “Okay.”

As he leads her away, Jackie yells three things after her.

“ _Stephanie_!” she cries, and Hyde determinedly ignores her.

“You’re wrong, we  _are_  friends! We’re  _best friends_!”

Hyde gets into the cop’s car.

“I -  _I_   ** _love_** _you_!”

She stares at her handcuffed wrists while something claws at her chest, unbidden and persisting and feeling a lot like she’s drowning. She’s really done it, this time. She picks at the polish on her right thumb.  _Christ._

***

Hyde stares at the phone for a long time, unable to get her arms to move. She stares so long that the officer starts to get angsty.

“Look, are you gonna make your call or what?”

Hyde bites her lip. Picks up the phone.

“Hey Red.”

“ _Stephanie_!”

Mother of fuck, Red actually sounds excited to hear from her. This day could literally not get any worse. She listens to his story about Eric embarrassing himself, and manages to choke out a laugh in the appropriate spot. She mustn’t do a very good job, though, because Red questions it.

“ _Is everything alright?”_

“Um.” Hyde twirls the cord round her fingers. “Actually, Red, I sort of. I sort of got arrested.”

The line crackles.

“ _Arrested for what?_ ”

“I -“ She closes her eyes, as if that will help ease the nausea rising in her throat. “Possession.”

There’s silence.

“ _Possession of_ ** _what_** _?_ ”

“Red.” God, her voice even breaks on the word. She can’t look at the officer out of embarrassment, and instead focuses on a dent in the drab wall. “I’m sorry.”

Red hangs up.

***

“Stephanie,” cries the voice Hyde wants to avoid for all eternity, the minute she steps out of the station. “Thank god!”

Jackie throws her arms around her, but Hyde stays stiff and unmoving. She can’t believe she got  _arrested_. Red’s gonna - Red’s gonna kill her. And Jackie is still, for some reason,  _here_ , even though all she wants is to go  _home_.

“Stephanie? Are you okay?” Jackie’s talking at a million-miles a minute. She used to think it was funny, but now it’s just giving her a headache. “I asked my dad to help make bail, and he wasn’t pleased, but he did it, and I’m so sorry, I can’t  _believe_  I mentioned the bag, and now you’ve gone to jail for me and -“

Hyde pries her hands off her. “Jackie. Go home.”

“What?”

“Just. Go home.” Hyde sticks her hands in her pockets and walks past her. She’s got no time - no energy - to deal with Jackie right now. The younger girl’s clogs click on the pavement as she follows her, evidently not giving up on her just yet.

“I don’t understand. Are you okay? Did something happen?”

“You mean aside from getting arrested?”

Jackie flinches at her blunt tone. “Are... are you mad at me?”

Hyde wants to rip her own hair out. She wants to kick things and smash things and hit someone. She settles on digging her nails into her palms.

“Yes.”

Jackie’s bottom lip quivers. “Why?”

“You got me arrested.”

“I know.” Jackie tugs her to a stop, pink nails clenching around Hyde’s arm. “I know, Stephanie, I’m sorry. Thank you.”

“What?”

“Thank you? You saved me from - from -  _that_. You went to  _jail_  for me. Thank you.”

Hyde feels surreal. She feels like she’s in art class, being asked to decipher meaning from a picture of a fruit bowl. “I didn’t go to jail for you.”

Jackie furrows her brow. “Yes you did.”

“ _No_ , I didn’t.” She did, kind of. Whatever. “I’m not - I’m not gonna be your protector, Jackie. That ain’t my job.”

“I never said it was. Where did you even  _get_  that from?”

Hyde pulls her arm from Jackie’s grip and folds it across her chest instead. “Look,” she says, deciding that it’s about time Jackie was made aware of the exact nature of their arrangement, friendship, whatever.

“I know you dumped Kelso,” says Hyde. “And you may not realise you’re doing it, but I know you latched onto me because you’re feeling vulnerable. And that was fine, for a while, but I’m not gonna be there to save your ass every time. I’m not protecting you from the big bad scary world, okay? So would you  _please_  just leave me alone. I want to go home, have a nap, and try to work out how I’m going to face Red. I don’t have  _time_  for you right now.”

It’s harsh. Hyde doesn’t care.

“That’s such bull,” cries Jackie eventually, after losing their impromptu staring match. “You’re such - you’re such an asshole, Stephanie!  _I’m not protecting you_ , blah blah. Stop acting like you’re some kind of commitment phobic douchebag! You’re not my boyfriend, you’re my friend. I don’t need you to  _protect me_. I just want you to be  _my friend_.”

Hyde’s glad she’s wearing her sunglasses, because right now she feels like she wants to cry. She feels a bit like she actually might. “Go home, Jackie.”

Jackie’s mouth opens and closes a few times, and she’s looking at Hyde like she doesn’t know her, and  _god_ , doesn’t she have enough to deal with, right now?

She starts walking, and this time Jackie doesn’t follow her.

***

“What were you  _thinking_?”

Red’s speech blurs into a stream of disappointment, and yelling, and Mrs Forman biting her nails in the background. Hyde can’t even bear to look at him. Shame fills her entire being, yet it still takes all her willpower to throw Jackie under the bus, like she’s betraying her somehow.

Red gets Mrs F to call Jackie over, and wow, okay,  _ouch_. Half an hour of yelling and lectures and it still didn’t hurt half as bad as that simple, unembellished moment where it’s revealed he doesn’t trust her.

Jackie stares at her with wide eyes when she gets there, mascara smudged along the bottom of her eyes. There’s a terrible moment when Hyde thinks she’s going to lie, use the truth against her to punish her for being rude, but she doesn’t.

Jackie hangs her head, and she fesses up, and Hyde feels even worse, somehow.

“Jackie,” ( _and isn’t this poetic_ , she thinks,  _how she’s the one chasing after her now?_ ) “Wait up.”

Jackie raises her eyebrows at her, gaze steely.

“Thank you,” says Hyde. She tucks a non-existent bit of hair behind her ear, a nervous tick she’s never quite managed to shake. “I thought, I thought maybe you wouldn’t, uh. Thanks.”

Jackie gives a hollow laugh. “We’re not all like you, Hyde. I’d never do that.”

Hyde blinks at her. “Whatever.”

Jackie juts her chin upwards.

“ _Whatever_ ,” she mocks, practically spitting the word. “Look. I’m still grateful to you, I guess, but I want you to know that I take back what I said earlier.”

Her eyes are shiny in the light of the Forman’s porch. “I didn’t get you arrested, Stephanie. You got  _yourself_  arrested, because like it or not, I  _am_  your friend. When you’re done being pissy about the fact, give me a call. Your nails look terrible.”

It’s such a Jackie thing to bring up that it leaves her speechless, and staring after her as she disappears into the night, a comeback still resting half-formed on her tongue.

**iii.**

Chip’s... an asshole.

This becomes painfully evident within the first couple of words Hyde says to him. She’s a little biased (although she’s not admitting that), because yeah, Jackie just decides to show up with  _some guy_? After not being in the basement for two weeks? And now she’s acting like their fight didn’t even happen? Like everything’s  _fine_? But even objectively Chip still turns out to be a piece of shit.

“You know,” he says slyly, after trapping her in conversation while Jackie’s off elsewhere, “You and I could get out of here if you wanted.”

Hyde scowls, and shoves her hands in her pockets, leaning away form him. “Aren’t you here with Jackie?”

“Yeah, but, you know. We’re not ‘together’, or anything.”

Jesus, Jackie really does know how to pick ‘em. Probably why she hung round Hyde so much.

“You’re not my type.”

In the pockets of her coat, Hyde curls her fingers around her brass knuckles. She’s not gonna punch him,  _she’s not_ , because she’s trying real hard to be less angry and aggressive all the time (Jackie being in shit with her has  _not_  helped this, at all), and so instead she just glares and focuses on where the cold metal digs into her skin.

“What is, then?”

Dark hair. Short. Bossy. A smile to light up the sky.

“Not you. I don’t do cheaters.”

“Jackie and I aren’t a thing. Won’t be, either.”

“Maybe you should tell her that,” grits out Hyde. “She’s kinda young, only had one boyfriend. Might be gettin’ the wrong idea from you.”

Chip scoffs, and his stupid knock-off leather jacket bunches around his shoulders when he shrugs. “Whatever, man. She’s a bitch.”

With those three words, Chip seals his fate. She’s almost relieved.

“Oh, no,” mumbles Hyde, because Red’s not going to be pleased that she laid out some rick kid on his driveway. Her left hand is already curling into a fist and she gives herself a second to look at Chip, and during the second she thinks about getting arrested, and the sleazy cop who hit on her, and Red’s anger and the withdrawal she’s going through and Jackie throwing her zen lessons back in her face, and then she thinks about the exact way Chip’s mouth moved when he said the word  _bitch_.

She hits him. It feels good.

“Stephanie!”

 _Fuck_.

“Oh my god!”

 _Double fuck_.

“What happened?”

Hyde stares at her.  _Tell her he grabbed your ass,_ she thinks _. Tell her he grabbed your ass. Say nothing. Say_ ** _something_** _. Jesus Christ, just tell her he_ ** _grabbed your ass_** _._

“I...  _nothing_! You... and the guy... said bitch and - and -  ** _nothing_**!”

Jackie looks between her and Chip’s deadweight body like a freakin’ slot machine, excitement dancing across her features. She points, bouncing on her toes and throwing her arms around.

“Oh my god.” She places a hand over her heart. “I - he called me a bitch, and you - you hit him! That’s what happened, isn’t it?”

“...No?”

“ _Liar!_ ” accuses Jackie. She puts her hands over her mouth. “You - oh, you  _do_  care!”

God, Jackie really is just amazing at making her feel bad.

“I - of course I - what the hell? We’re friends. Of course I care.”

Jackie’s eyes quickly narrow, happiness sliding off her face. “Oh, so  _now_  you’ll admit it?”

Hyde pinches the bridge of her nose, acutely aware of the fact that several party-goers are still looking at her. “Do we have to talk about this now?”

Jackie folds her hands on her hips. “Um, yes?”

Hyde groans, rubbing her hand across her eyebrows. “I - fine. I’m sorry. We‘re friends.”

Jackie taps her foot, and the gesture somehow drags the words from Hyde’s throat.

“Look,” she says, and internally wonders whether she should invest in blood pressure tablets, with the amount of spiking her heart rate’s doing, “the other night was a fight, okay? I was mad, and tired, and... and I was  _freaked out_ about facing Red. I shouldn’t have said that stuff to you.”

It’s the most emotionally honest she thinks she’s ever been with Jackie in her life, which is probably a worrying statistic. It does the trick, though, because Jackie’s expression melts back into one of tentative happiness.

“Thank you,” she says, voice small. “I really am sorry about mentioning the bag, though. And for... for making you feel like you had to protect me.”

Hyde shrugs. “S’ok. You didn’t, really - well, you kind of did, but I was mostly using that as an excuse for why I kept hanging round you. I mean, you’re annoying as shit, Jackie. It goes against the very fibre of my being that I like you as much as I do.”

Jackie beams, and throws her arms around her. Hyde pats her shoulder awkwardly.

“I know there were a lot of insults in there,” she says, voice muffled against Hyde’s jacket, “But I’m electing to ignore them in favour of the fact that you  _like me_.”

Hyde sighs deeply. When it doesn’t seem that Jackie’s ready to let go, she tentatively puts her own hands on Jackie’s waist. “Don’t shout it around.”

She feels Jackie smile against her shoulder. “I almost definitely will.”

They pull apart, and Hyde spends a few seconds grinning goofily at her, which is a new development. And then Kelso wolf whistles and she promptly jumps backwards, crashing into the esky and knocking ice everywhere.

“Shut up, dillhole,” she yells, half tripping over a can of soda. She bends to clean up her mess, still muttering insults to herself, and misses the way Jackie’s cheeks are beet red.

**iv.**

Things go back to normal. Jackie invites herself back to Hyde’s room post BBQ and practically forces her into letting her do her nails, and then again a week later, and eventually they fall back into their old routine where the only difference is the fact that Hyde’s interior monologue is a constant stream of curse words. Her eyes start catching on Jackie’s lips, and her hands, and (on several occasions) her ass. This is bad.

For the most part, Hyde ignores it. She successfully did it with Donna, after all, so she’s sure Jackie’ll be no different. Give it a couple of weeks, and it’ll all go away.

It doesn’t go away.

Whilst this is still, unbelievably, atrociously bad, it doesn’t really culminate until a few weeks post Veteran’s Day when they start to head into the Christmas season.

“Secret Santa,” proclaims Donna happily, thrusting the paper-filled top hat at Hyde. “Come on, Hyde, you gotta.”

There once was a time when that smile would have made Hyde bend over backwards on hot coals. It’s kind of weird how now it doesn’t do  _anything_.

“Yeah, come on, Stephanie,” coos Jackie, and right, okay,  _there’s_  the stomach flips. “It’ll be fun.”

Hyde looks at her. The outstretched hat. Forman’s smug looking smile like he knows exactly what’s going on. Her stomach flips for an entirely different reason.

She sighs in resignation, and picks out a bit of paper.  _Kelso_. She sends a silent prayer of thanks to Jimmy Hendrix.

“That’s the spirit,” says Donna, and punches her shoulder. “Your go, Jackie.”

***

Coming out to Forman makes her feel... not good.

In fact, it makes her want to get in the Cruiser and drive hellishly fast down the highway until she’s halfway to Canada. This does not, however, appear to be an option, and this is how she ends up in Forman’s room at one in the morning, pulling her own hair out and being decidedly un-zen.

“Alright,” he says, eventually, in his rarely used Red-voice. She’s still not entirely convinced he knows he can do it. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing,” mutters Hyde, unconvincingly.

Forman quirks an eyebrow. “Really? You’ve been pacing a hole in my carpet for a half hour.”

She stops. “Have not.“

“You have.” Forman looks up at her from his bed with a worried expression. “Seriously. Steph. What’s going on?”

_Ah, fuck._

“Don’t call me that,” grumbles Hyde, although it’s ruined by the choked up nature of her throat. Freakin’ Forman and his use of first names. “You’re such a pansy.”

Forman just looks at her.

“Fuck,” she says, and starts pacing again. “Okay. Here’s the thing. I’m going to tell you something, and it’s not really a good something. I mean, it’s okay, like, I’m fine, but it’s also, not. So. I’m going to tell it to you. And. You can do with it, uh, what you will. So.”

“Hyde,” says Forman, and leans forward on his elbows, footie-pyjamas creasing with the movement. “I’m not gonna freak out about your whopping big crush on Jackie.”

She chokes. Forman continues as if he hasn’t noticed.

“I mean, I’m kind of freaked out that it’s on  _Jackie_ , because she’s, you know, evil, but I somehow suspect that that’s not what you’re worried about.”

Hyde stares at him. “How did you - you  _know_? Since  _when_?”

“Honestly?” Hyde nods. “The look on your face after I told you about Buddy.”

Static fills her brain.

“What the  _fuck_?” she says eventually, and frogs him hard on the shoulder. “Are you - you couldn’t have  _told me_?”

“I thought you would when you were ready!”

“I -“ Hyde shakes her head. “This is unbelievable. I hate you.”

Forman grins stupidly. “Ah, but you don’t hate  _Jackie_  -“

“Get bent,” she replies, and hits him again. “Jesus fucking Christ. I’m going to bed.”

“No, don’t do that,” says Forman, reigning in his mockery and swallowing his grin. “Look, I’m sorry. And seriously, it’s okay, you know, be who you are - “

“Oh my god,  _shut up,_ ” grumbles Hyde, although she feels almost ridiculously light, like she could float out of her body at any instant. Forman  _knew_. Forman knew and he still let her live with him, was still ready to stand up for her when she got busted for pot, still let her hang around with him and Donna without ever being weird about it. She shoves at his shoulder, which is pretty much a hug, for her. “Thanks, Forman.”

He smiles back her, brotherly affection radiating from every dimple and making her feel sick. “Anything for you, orphan girl.”

“Alright,” says Hyde. “We’re done talking.”

“Just let me love you,” cries Eric dramatically as she leaves, her only response a casual flip of the bird. She goes to bed feeling better than she has in a long while, and even manages to avoid thoughts of Jackie as she drifts off to sleep. Things are good.

**v.**

When everything does, inevitably, go to shit, it’s about week before Christmas and all the fault of an old Bowie interview.

Jackie was insistent she watch it, and nobody could be bothered to fight her on it. Forman’s doing homework and Kelso and Fez are distracted with some stupid game, so the TV was pretty much up for grabs anyway. Hyde’s reading a comic and not really watching, with her feet propped on the table.

She does, however, pride herself on being relatively aware of her surroundings at all times, and it’s for this reason that she goes stiff as a board when  _it_  happens.

 _I’m bisexual,_ says Bowie, and Hyde’s eyes snap up.

Even though she knows, logically, that nobody’s looking at her, she can feel an unbearable prickle at the back of her neck, just like the one she gets before shoplifting something. She knows what she is. She’s cool with it. It’s still freakin’ weird to hear it said on the TV.

 _But what does that mean, though?_ asks the interviewer, a shark-like grin on his face.

_It means that I’m bisexual._

The atmosphere in the basement doesn’t change as much as she might have expected it too. There’s no silence quiet enough to hear a pin drop. There’s no sudden undercurrent of tension. Fez and Kelso are still making ridiculous amounts of noise, it’s still a flurry of movement. The only difference is how goddamn  _on edge_  she feels.

_Are you hiding something else, perhaps?_

Hyde’s hands curl around her magazine. Her chest is tight.

 _No._ When she glances again at the TV, Bowie looks fed up. _I’m bisexual._

There’s a sudden, shuddery gasp from the couch. Hyde looks over from the corner of her eye.

“Jackie?”

The girl’s knuckles are snow white and clenched in her skirt, everyone else suddenly eyeing her with concern. Donna touches her elbow gently, confusion ripe across her face.

“Are you okay?”

“Cramps,” says Jackie numbly, and all three of the guys make similar noises of disgust. Fez and Kelso grimace, the latter planting his hands firmly over his ears.

“God, Jackie,” he cries loudly, “Give a man some warning!”

Jackie twists her fingers in the fabric, eyes still wide and panicked. “I gotta go.”

She disappears in a flurry of movement, and Hyde hates herself for wanting to help. She’s pretty sure she never used to be so caring - pretty sure that less than a year ago, she would have celebrated Jackie’s sudden departure. Forman gives her a  _look_ , and Hyde sighs.

***

The night air outside is cold, and Stephanie shivers against it, drawing her jacket closer around her. Gravel crunches under the boots Jackie bought her as she heads over to the younger girl’s car, rapping lightly on the window. Jackie jumps about a foot in the air, hands flying away from her face to reveal mascara streaks. She flicks the lock, though, and so Hyde slides in next to her.

“Hey.”

Jackie throws herself on her.

“Oh,” mumbles Hyde. “Um, okay.”

Hesitantly, she brings her hands up to hold onto Jackie. The other girl shakes against her.

“Hey, woah now, Jackie. It’s okay. You’re okay. This is gonna be fine. This whole thing is gonna be fine.”

“I’m - I’m -“

Hyde pats her shoulder gently, wishing she was better at this whole talking thing.

Around sobs: “I’m a lesbian.”

She does pull back at that, just slightly, so she can see Jackie’s face. “You - really?”

“No,” sniffles Jackie. She wipes her nose with her sleeve. “Yes. Maybe. I don’t know.”

She buries her face back in Hyde’s neck. “Do you know you just gave every possible answer?”

“Shut up,” grumbles Jackie, but at least she’s not crying, anymore. Hyde strokes the back of her head.

“I’m serious, Jackie, it’s okay. And if anyone ever tells you it’s not, you send them my way, alright? I gotta pair of brass knuckles.”

Jackie’s chuckle flutters across her collarbone, sending shivers down Hyde’s spine. She presses her lips against the top of her head, in something that’s not quite a kiss, but not quite not one, either.

“You want me to drive you home?”

She nods. “Yes please.”

“Okay.”

***

Jackie shows up bright and early next morning, looking her usual put-together self. Bleary-eyed, Hyde takes her offered cup of coffee, feeling confused and more than a little out of her depth.

“Hi,” she says. Jackie plasters on a smile.

“Hello,” she says, rocking back and forward on her toes. She looks nervous as shit, but like she’s trying to hide it. “I just wanted to apologise about last night. I must’ve caught a high off of you guys, or something.”

Still half asleep, Hyde frowns, but out of respect for Jackie’s dignity elects not to mention that they’d hadn’t smoked anything. “Okay? I - you don’t have to apologise, it’s fine. Figuring that out is scary stuff, man. I get it.”

Jackie waves a manicured hand at her, sounding far too breezy for it to be real. “Well, thanks, but don’t worry about it. I’m not a lesbian.”

She gives a horrible, false laugh, raking her hands through her hair. “Don’t know what I was thinking. I’m probably just upset about Michael, or something. Whatever.“

She looks at her curiously. “What do you mean, you get it?”

“Uh.” Hyde hesitates. Last night, she was more than prepared to come out to Jackie. Make her feel like she was less alone, or whatever. Maybe she should have guessed that the realisation would have been followed by backtracking, and prepared accordingly.

“I - uh - get it,” she says, eventually, deciding to  _fuck it_ , she trusts Jackie ( _and isn’t that a development?_ ). “I’m, you know. I - I like - Bowie.”

It’s hardly her most articulate moment, and she frowns down at her coffee, trying to drag her feelings into coherent sentences.

“Sorry,” she says, and tugs on the collar of her  _Zeppelin_  tee self-consciously. Her stomach is doing that thing it does when an elevator comes to a sudden stop. “I don’t like Bowie. I mean that I’m - I’m  _like_  Bowie.”

“Bisexual,” Hyde adds, belatedly. “Yeah.”

Jackie’s face flits throughs several emotions in the space of five seconds, the predominant one being gaping like a fish.

“You - oh. Oh.”

Jackie looks like she’s scrambling for footing on a particularly slippery rock. “Um, that’s cool?”

Hyde feels a blush spread across her cheeks. “Yeah, well, whatever. I just thought, since you, you know, that -“

“I’m not,” Jackie says again, clasping her hands tightly in front of her. “I’m - I’m not.”

Her eyes have got a panicky, animal quality to them.  _Ah_ , thinks Hyde. She remembers this bit.

“Alright,” she says, placatingly. “Sorry.”

Jackie shuffles on her feet. “Um, Stephanie? Even though I am, completely, one hundred percent  _not_  that, could you maybe not spread what I said around? To like, anyone?”

Hyde nods.

“I don’t gossip,” she says. “Promise.”

Jackie still looks fidgety, so Hyde says: “You wanna do my nails? I’ll need breakfast first, though.”

Relief drains out of Jackie in waves. “Of course. I know a place.”

**vi.**

Although Hyde’s not happy about it, she’s neither surprised or pissed when Jackie gets back together with Kelso. On a personal note it‘s less than ideal, sure, but objectively? Objectively she understands.

If she had to hazard a guess, she’d say Jackie freaked out about her identity crisis and decided to run back to something familiar. That makes sense. She was prepared for it. What she wasn’t prepared for was for Jackie to start acting like she didn’t exist.

They stop hanging out so slowly that Hyde doesn’t even realise until it’s too late. Jackie stops addressing her in conversations, stops even looking at her when they’re with the group. On the rare occasion Hyde manages to grab her by herself, she always finds some kind of excuse to leave before she even gets a word in. It’s weird.

She’s got a suspicion. It’s not a great suspicion, and it’s probably a little out of whack. But Jackie’s acting like she’s scared to be around her, so she had to come up with  _something_.

Either, she decides one night, with a joint in one hand and a beer in the other, Jackie freaked out about the bi thing, or...

Hyde blows a smoke ring.

Or, she thinks again, Jackie likes her.  _Romantically_.

How about that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the bowie interview is real (although i took liberty w the dialogue since its from memory). its p bad


	2. part two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello everybody ive finally completed this fic (in my defence this is significantly longer than pt1)! initially i wrote part 2 from jackie’s perspective and it stalled for a very long time - until i on a whim decided to switch to hydes pov and rewrite the entire thing. if you guys want to see jackie’s chapter i might post it as a companion to this fic, so let me know!! i kind of fell in love with these two again through writing this, and i might do some slice of life things with them yet...
> 
> i fiddled with the timeline here because initially i forgot that the promise ring was the end of s3 not s4. i hope it’s understandable and not too confusing! i also want to say thank you so much for all the lovely comments left on part 1, they were overwhelming and made me so happy! its so weird to me that something i thought was a very niche interest garnered such a positive response <3 us wlw really did just project onto hyde, didn’t we??? anyway enough from me, here we go with part 2, i hope it lives up to expectations!

**i.**

So Jackie’s back with Kelso. Fine. Jackie’s ignoring her existence. Also fine. Hyde has managed to garner herself one hell of a crush on Jackie.

Less fine.

It’s worse than if they were still friends, because Hyde — _urgh_ , Hyde is actually _missing_ her. She misses Jackie sitting on her bed, chattering her ear off about things Hyde doesn’t care about. She misses the way Jackie used to grab her arm to drag her places, and she misses being able raise her eyebrows at her when Forman does something stupid. She even misses having her nails painted freaking pink. She could probably still do that, but she has a _reputation_ , she‘s not just going to go out and buy it for herself.

During this time Eric and Donna also break up, which is messy. There’s a whole thing with a promise ring and Donna wearing it on a necklace, but Hyde doesn’t really know the specifics because she was too busy dealing with Kelso wanting to get Jackie one. He chickens out, though, so at least that’s something Hyde can be grateful for. But on the whole the situation sucks, mostly because Hyde can see Donna’s point but doesn’t know how to make Forman _get it_. She thinks Jackie probably could. In her weaker moments, she thinks that if her and Jackie were still friends, they might have been able to work together to prevent this whole thing from happening.

She tries not to think about it.

Instead she drags Kelso and Fez to Forman’s bedroom, and together they basically force him out of bed and carry him to Funland. Not her best plan, maybe, but the guy stinks and he needs to see the sunlight before he wastes away.

“Cheer up, Forman,” grumbles Hyde as they trickle through the theme park. Jackie is flouncing about up ahead, tucked under Kelso’s arm and sucking on a lollipop. Forman lets out a low, pathetic whimper, and she punches his shoulder. “Hey, forget about Donna for a second, alright? Jesus.”

Forman glares at her. “That’s rich,” he mutters. Admittedly that’s kind of fair, because she’s been staring at Jackie for the last ten minutes, but she still hits him again.

“Shut up, mopey. Let’s get you a damn corn dog.”

***

They lose Kelso, and Hyde thinks it’s funny until Jackie starts whining about finding him, pointing her pouty lips in Hyde’s direction. She has all her prizes bundled under her arms, and some crappy tiara perched on her head, and Hyde finds it equal parts pathetic and annoying.

“Jesus, Jackie,” she says, because apparently she’s the only one in this damn group capable of suppressing her emotions. “Lighten up. He’s like a dog, he’ll find his way home eventually. Stop freakin’ about him.”

Jackie glances away over the crowd, worrying her lip between her teeth.

“Michael’s too stupid for that!” she bursts, and Hyde snickers. “Oh, shut up!”

“Nah,” says Hyde. “Come on, lets go do something fun. You wanna go on the Ferris Wheel?”

She knows Jackie does, because she has her whole delusion that Point Place looks like Paris from up high. Kelso, however, is too pea-brained and scared of the fall to go on it with her, and Hyde might be feeling a little smug about the fact that she beats him in this respect. Jackie shifts on her feet for a moment, possibly weighing up whether it’s worth breaking her self-imposed avoidance of Hyde for a shot at the view, or if going on the ride means sacrificing her chance to find Kelso.

Hyde wins.

“You really need all that?” she asks as they wait for their turn, gesturing at Jackie’s haul. Jackie glares, but it’s lessened by the way she’s juggling with the prizes to keep them from toppling over.

“Yes,” she says, and nearly drops the piñata. “They’re pink, I like them.”

Hyde flicks her tiara. “Whatever, princess.”

Jackie blushes, and looks away from Hyde to the front of the line to see how long they have to wait. She reaches up onto her tip-toes, wobbling a little on her clogs. She’s going to twist a damn ankle.

Hyde clenches her jaw. “Gimme that.”

“Hm?”

She clicks her fingers at the prize threatening to tumble out of Jackie’s arms. “Give it. You’re gonna drop it and ruin it, and then I’m gonna have to listen to you complain the whole ride.”

“Oh.” Jackie blinks down at herself, and bites her lip. “Thank you, Hyde.”

“Shut up.”

**ii.**

Forman thinks he’s being subtle, with this stupid party, but he’s not. The guy doesn’t have a subtle bone in his body. But Hyde lets him go ahead with it anyway, because it’s probably better in the long run for him to project his anger at love onto Hyde, rather than onto Donna and subsequently ruin any chance at them getting back together.

Hyde, it turns out, is a damn good friend.

But it makes her skin prickle, that he and Fez have been sitting around talking about her. Thinking she needs a boyfriend. She doesn’t usually engage with Donna’s feminist rants, mostly because she doesn’t see the point in trying to change a deck stacked against her with words rather than fists, but Jesus. She has a point. Not to mention that, since the break-up seems to be drawing out all of Forman’s worst qualities, Hyde’s starting to think Donna might’ve been in the right more than she initially thought.

Anyway. At this point Hyde’s doing more introspection about their relationship than either of them, and that’s not exactly something she plans on continuing with. She refocuses on the party – Jackie was here at one point, a while ago, and she’d brought Big Rhonda. Hyde can’t decide if she should be flattered Jackie brought a girl or offended that she picked _Rhonda_. But Fez seems to like her, so maybe it’s not all terrible. And besides, there are a couple of other people here who Hyde wouldn’t mind going a few rounds with. She’s not easy, no matter what they say about her, she just likes sex and she doesn’t mind going after it every once in a while. Kelso sure as heck doesn’t get shit for it, so she shouldn’t either.

She thinks Kat Peterson is here, which is weird because it’s a party at _Forman’s_ , so that’s indicating she might be a safe bet for some more hands action. But it might upset Jackie if she finds out, because the girl has some weird insecurity issues, especially when it comes to Kat, and she doesn’t want to accidentally add to them.

Hyde catches herself mid-train of thought, and scowls down at her beer. This thing with Jackie is getting ridiculous. Like, okay, she sympathizes that Jackie’s going through some shit, and she’d even be willing to give her a couple of free passes for it. But Hyde’s _pining_. That’s something she doesn’t _do_. And so what if Jackie’d rather date Michael freaking Kelso than acknowledge something about herself? That’s not _Hyde’s_ problem. She needs to chill the fuck out.

She spares Kat a last glance and then picks a guy at random, gulping down the rest of her beer in one and making a beeline for him. He’s in a _Stones_ tee, and she gestures at her own as she approaches.

“Guess we match,” she says, and he laughs, raising his cup at her in agreement.

She thinks he might work at the radio station with Donna, and he nods at her shirt appreciatively. “Nice choice, man. That was a good album.”

Finally, somebody who doesn’t fill their ears with disco. He’ll do fine. Hyde raises her eyebrow at him, an invitation, and pulls out her pack of cigarettes.

“Wanna go for a smoke?”

“Sure.”

She doesn’t think of Jackie for the rest of the evening.

***

Hyde doesn’t tell anybody this, but they actually go out for a few weeks.

For one, it’d ruin her image. She doesn’t do _relationships_ , and she certainly doesn’t go on _dates_. Also, she doesn’t want to give Forman the satisfaction of knowing his dumb party actually worked. But his name is Luke and for their first — _urgh_ , for their first _date_ — they get take-out burgers and he lets her pick the music to play on the station for the night. So it’s fun, and it doesn’t completely suck. He doesn’t sulk, and he doesn’t make her feel annoyingly un-zen. But he doesn’t offer to paint her nails, either.

Hyde is _so_ screwed.

***

“I just, I can’t believe my mom’s _gone_ ,” says Donna into the casserole Mrs Forman sent Hyde over with, shovelling another spoonful into her mouth. She moans. “God, are these crushed potato chips?”

Hyde chuckles half-heartedly, and pulls her foot up onto the chair, resting her chin on her knee.“I think so, yeah. Also, uh, the way you’re inhaling those doesn’t really speak well as to how you’re doing.”

Donna heaves a breath. She looks tired and strung out, eyes still red around the edges and her lashes all clumped together from tears. “I just. I knew she was gonna leave, right? I mean, she kept saying she was gonna. So I was waiting for it, but now it’s happened and I still feel like it hit me total unawares.”

She looks down into her food, swilling her fork around. “I don’t know. She hasn’t exactly been world’s best mom recently. But she didn’t even say a proper goodbye.”

“It sucks,” says Hyde, because it does. Donna’s face contorts, and she drops the fork into the dish with a clatter, wiping furiously at her cheeks.

“God,” she chokes. “God, I just. Can I have a hug?”

Hyde’s stomach flips, and she drops her leg back to the floor, scooching her chair over. “Yeah, man. Yeah, of course. C’mere.”

She wraps an arm around Donna, who drops her head down onto Hyde’s shoulder. Hyde wishes — she doesn’t even know. That she were better at this, maybe. That Donna didn’t have to endure it. When Hyde’s mom ditched her, the worst part was all the pitying stares and empty words of comfort, like they thought Hyde couldn’t take care of herself. So she’s trying not to pity Donna, but it’s hard because it just — it just _sucks_.

They stay like that for a minute, until Donna pulls away, sniffling. There's a second, though, where she jsut kind of hovers there, still close to Hyde’s face. Hyde blinks at her. She can see all the freckles dotted across Donna’s nose, the faint lines around her mouth, and she feels _nothing_. The passage of time is a crazy thing. And then Donna surges forward, and presses her lips against Hyde’s.

 _Woah_.

“Woah!” yelps Hyde, wrenching backwards. Donna immediately colours, and Hyde sees the realisation flood into her eyes before she practically throws herself from her chair, backing up against the fridge.

“Oh my god,” she says, frantic. “Oh my god, Hyde, I’m sorry, I don’t know what I was _doing_ — oh _god,_ what’s _wrong_ with me? I’m sorry, _crap_ , I’m —”

Hyde stares, shocked, and licks her lips. “Uh,” she says.

Donna starts crying again, sinking down onto the kitchen floor and pulling her knees up to her chest, sobs wracking through her shoulders.

“Oh, shit,” says Hyde. She gets up and crosses to Donna, crouching down next to her. “Hey, Donna. It’s okay. Hey. Oh, Christ. Look, Donna, it’s fine, okay? I’m not mad.”

Donna looks up through her fingers, and Hyde swallows.

“You’re just going through something, okay? There’s nothin’ wrong with you.” She touches her arm, and tries to make her laugh. “I mean, look, you were probably just looking for comfort, right? If it’d been Forman’s skinny ass in here you woulda jumped ‘im too. Probably sooner.”

Donna lets out a weak laugh. “Yeah. Probably. God, that woulda been bad.”

“There ya go,” says Hyde, and squeezes her arm. “You’re gonna be fine, Donna.”

**iii.**

In a move that is clearly designed by God to screw Hyde over even more than she already is, Jackie gets a job. She’s working at the Cheese Palace in the mall, and she has to wear this little maiden get-up, all bows and string. They go to visit her at work and Hyde damn near chokes.

“The floor’s real shiny, and I can see your heinie!”

It’s not exactly a gold-star burn, and it’s worse because she knows she’s acting like a fourth grader. She _knows_ this. But for some reason she just can’t stop herself from reaching out to tug on Jackie’s metaphorical pigtails. Maybe it’s because it works – Jackie looks at her properly for the first time in weeks, lips curling in disgust, and she even whacks her on the upper arm. Hyde pokes her tongue out at her. She figures it’s a start.

***

“Hey,” says Donna after school one day, as they’re all milling about the driveway, “I was thinking, for prom, we should all go in the one car. It’ll be fun!”

Donna has her best smile on, a little overly eager to sign herself up for crowding into the _Cruiser_. Forman squints at her.

“You need a ride, don’t you?”

Donna, for her part, doesn’t deny it. Hyde was gonna bum a lift off Forman anyway, so she doesn’t really mind. She shrugs and hops up onto the hood of the cruiser, though the metal’s cold even through her jeans. Winter’s starting to move in — and if the weather weren’t enough of a clue, last week Jackie’d given them all a lecture on the appropriate changes they all needed to make to their wardrobes. It’d involved a lot of stuff about colour theory. Hyde hadn’t really listened.

“Well, I can’t,” pipes up Jackie, though she sounds kind of disappointed. She tugs her coat around her a little tighter, and spares a quick glance in Hyde’s direction. Not quite _at_ her, but close enough. “I’m going with Michael.”

“What, you don’t wanna stick with tradition?”

Like most things she says around Jackie, Hyde doesn’t _mean_ to say it, it just sort of comes out. Jackie blushes, pink blossoming high on her cheekbones, and Forman snickers. Hyde figures she might as well commit to it.

“Well?” she says, raising her eyebrow at Jackie over her sunglasses. Jackie stares at her, mouth hanging open, motionless enough that the cold breeze could have frozen her solid. Hyde resits the urge to reach out and nudge her jaw closed.

“Wait, wait, wait.” Fez steps in, hands on his hips. “Hyde, are you asking _Jackie_ to _prom?_ ”

“No, man,” says Hyde, even though she kind of is. “I’m just, y’know. Giving her a get out of jail free card from an evening with Kelso.”

“Ah,” says Fez, and nods. “I see. Burn.”

He strikes up a different conversation, and Hyde turns her attention to it, pretty satisfied that she’s at least made Jackie _consider_ the possibility. She stills catches Jackie say very quietly, very faintly, almost to no one:

“I’m going with Michael.”

***

“ _Why_ am I not Snow Queen?” asks Jackie later, head lolling to the side in the picture of despondency. Apparently she’s having second thoughts about Hyde’s offer now Kelso’s off and ditched her, busy pretending some dumb high-school title gives him leadership qualities. They’re in the stairwell waiting for this goddamned tornado to pass, cold and bored and Jackie whining in her ear. It's really messing with Hyde’s plan to smoke up in Coach Ferguson’s office.

“Why do you care, man?” Hyde is leaning against the wall, her arms crossed in front of chest in an effort to keep warm. She wishes she had her leather jacket, or that she was wearing something other than this stupid navy dress. Jackie must be cold too, because her shoulders are starting to shiver.

“I just — I wanted to be Snow Queen, okay,” sighs Jackie, and presses on her temple. With her other hand she fiddles with her necklace, running her fingers along it, and Hyde looks away. “Ever since my dad cut me off I’ve been working that crappy job, and Michael is, well, _Michael_ , and I just — I feel like I have no control over my life and it _sucks_.”

Hyde shifts uncomfortably. On the one hand, she’s been trying to avoid Jackie in the hope that she’ll stop feeling however it is she does towards her. It’s been easier than she expected, especially as Kelso seems to rot her braincells and make her more insufferable than usual. But on the other...  She misses talking to Jackie, and she misses getting dragged to the mall and sitting with Jackie on her bed to do her nails. And obviously her feelings _haven’t_ gone away, in fact Hyde would even say they’ve intensified, and what’s the point in teasing Jackie and asking her to prom if she doesn’t follow through?

“Yeah, alright,” says Hyde. She swallows and uncrosses her arms, feeling a little like she’s about to walk into the lion’s den. “You wanna go break some rules?”

She holds out a hand and Jackie hesitates, like Hyde is proposing a lot more than the offer to blaze up in a teacher’s office. But then she nods, a tiny, jerky movement, and slips her hand into Hyde’s.

**iv.**

Hyde sits in Coach Ferguson’s chair because she’s been in the other one too many times, and takes a drag of her joint, sighing in relief. She’s hitched her dress up so she can prop her legs up on the desk, and wiggles her bare toes a little. She feels better already. They've cranked up the thermostat, and that combined with the pot means the room is basically swimming in warmth, a steady tingling throughout her body. Jackie smiles at her dopily across the table, chin resting on her palm. She extends her other hand expectantly, and Hyde passes her the joint.

“Do you think Donna’s right?” asks Jackie. “Did I lose because I need to be nicer?”

Hyde makes a non-committal noise and leans back in the chair, tilting her head towards the ceiling. “Why the hell should I know?”

Jackie pulls a face, and circles her lips around the joint. “I mean, I care about people. Just the other day I told a girl to wear pink lipstick instead of red, because red made her look pasty. That’s being nice.”

Hyde laughs, not all that kindly. “You are not nice,” she says, and reaches over to take back the joint. “Jesus.”

Jackie stares at her, affronted. “What — yes I am! You take that back right now! I’m nice _all the time_.”

Hyde scoffs again. Her vision is starting to get pleasantly blurry, and the high is smoothing out the more screechy edges of Jackie’s voice. “Whatever.”

But Jackie doesn’t want to let this go. She scooches her chair closer to the desk, looking aghast. “Name _one_ time I haven’t been nice.”

Jackie must be really feeling it if she’s deluding herself into thinking she’s _nice_. Kind, maybe. Generous, sometimes. But she’s not _nice_. Hyde holds up her left hand to prove the point, and waggles her fingers at her. The nail polish on them is black, and chipped almost to the cuticle, wrecked from cleaning dishes and fixing her car and picking at them during class. Jackie sobers. Her mouth forms a tiny, pink ‘oh’.

Hyde scoffs again. “ _Yeah_.”

Jackie seems to wrestle with herself for a few seconds. Hyde watches her face, the way her eyebrows twitch and her mouth wriggles around, like she’s fighting to keep the words from blurting out. It’s weird.

“Iwantedtodancewithyouatprom,” she says finally, in the one breath. Hyde nearly drops the joint, her legs abruptly falling off their perch as she inhales sharp enough to induce a coughing fit, flailing for some sensibility.

Eventually, she manages: “You — _what_?”

Jackie’s gone beet red, the colour staining her cheeks and dipping down to her collar bone. She licks her lips. “I wanted — I wanted to dance with you. When you took me to prom. The first time.”

Hyde isn’t sure about Jackie, but she suddenly becomes acutely aware of the music drifting over the radio.

“Huh,” she says.

She has a really terrible idea. The kind of idea that will almost definitely fuck her, and the Jackie-free existence she’s cultivated, over ten-fold. She kind of wants to do it anyway.

“You wanna dance now?” she asks, voice scratchy in her throat. Jackie’s eyes go wide as saucers.

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

She stubs out the joint on the coach’s desk, not caring about the blackened mark it leaves – call it a small payback for all the detentions she’s received. She gets up, and comes round to Jackie’s side of the desk. She’s smoothing out her dress, rearranging pleats, but her hands are shaking. Hyde comes to a stop in front of her, and Jackie half-raises her arms before looking confused.

“Um,” she says, and Hyde even manages to smirk, despite the fact that she can’t hear anything over the blood in her ears.

“I’ll lead.”

“Wait.” Jackie swallows, and then she reaches up and removes Hyde’s glasses from her face. Her fingertips brush Hyde’s temples — tiny, featherlight movements across the skin. She folds them closed and sets them carefully on the desk. Hyde’s forgotten how to move.

“Thanks,” she chokes out.

Jackie nods, silent, and settles her hand on Hyde’s bare shoulder. Hyde, because she is very cool and able to throw a punch hard enough to knock someone out, _does_ _not_ gasp. Jackie’s other hand slides over Hyde’s palm, the skin soft and warm and sending shivers down her spine, and she puts her own hand tentatively on the small of Jackie’s back. Jackie shudders. Good god, they’re a pair.

“You okay?” Her voice comes out hoarse.

“Whatever,” whispers Jackie. Her breath is hot on Hyde’s cheek, but she doesn’t look so nervous anymore. She even steps a little closer, hand curling around Hyde’s neck and starting to sway. Hyde goes with it.

The silky material of Jackie’s dress is slippery under her hand, and Hyde can feel her body warmth through the fabric. The lights are dimmed, a result of the tornado knocking out the electricity and leaving them on generator-power, and the music is but a low hum in the background, quiet enough that she can hear every hitch of Jackie’s breath. She summons up every memory of learning to dance with Mr Forman, and lets her hand flatten against Jackie’s back.

This was a really stupid idea.

Hyde feels – Christ, she’s not good with words, but she feels like she’s vibrating _golden_ , whatever the hell that means. Jackie’s pupils are blown wide, and she’s practically sparkling, what with the diamond earrings and the gloss on her lips. The reflections of the lights dance in her eyes like stars, and her blush glitters on her cheeks.

She’s gorgeous.

“You shoulda been Snow Queen,” murmurs Hyde suddenly, unable to stop herself. Something low in her abdomen wrenches her to the spot, halting their movement. “Those — those girls’ve got nothing on you, doll.”

Jackie’s breaths in sharply through her nose. Her mouth parts. “ _Stephanie_...”

Hyde leans in. It’ll be a mistake, of course it will, but she’s starting to think it’ll be the best damn one she ever makes.

And then Kelso — Jesus fucking _Christ_ , she’s going to kill him — bursts through the fucking door, in his stupid fucking tie with his stupid fucking hair, and stops short, words dying on his lips, Hyde’s own seconds away from Jackie’s.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Kelso,” barks Hyde, forcibly stopping herself from balling her hands into fists and tearing Jackie’s dress. Jackie looks horrified, a deer in the headlights expression plastered across her features, worse than when the cop found the pot, and just like then Hyde wants to shove herself between her and the cause. Kelso blinks at them.

“What? Hey, you guys dancin’ or something?”

Maybe Hyde should be glad he’s such a moron, but she’s not really about to feel anything charitable towards Kelso for the next ten years, if not longer. Jackie detaches herself from her, smoothing down her hair and panting slightly. Everything is slipping out of Hyde’s fingers. “Hyde was just helping me practice for our dance, baby.”

Hyde is going to scream. She’s had it with this emotional bullshit. She grabs her shoes and glasses from the table, vision whiting out at the edges, and storms over to Kelso.

“Later, Jackie,” she bites, and hits Kelso, hard as she can, in the arm. It doesn’t make her feel better.

**v.**

It takes Hyde a long goddamned time to stop feeling like she wants to ditch it all and drive to Canada. She almost thinks she understands why Bud became an alcoholic. This _sucks_.

She avoids going home, and when she eventually does, she’s blindsided by Mrs Forman, who’s twittering about the tornado and how worried she was that Stephanie had been caught in it, hugging her and putting her hands all over her face, and Hyde just – Hyde just bursts into freaking tears.

“Oh… _no_ …” says Forman, in the background, and Hyde sees him edge away from them, like the coward he is. In front of her Mrs Forman is all blurry, and she looks like she doesn’t know what to do, and Hyde literally _can’t stop_ crying.

“Oh, sweetie,” she says, and enfolds Stephanie in her arms even though Hyde is a good foot taller than her. She rubs circles on her back, squeezing tight. “Did something happen at the dance?”

Hyde shakes her head, pulling away. She sniffs, and wipes her nose on the back of her hand, still crying. Mrs Forman doesn’t even wince disapprovingly. She must be real worried.

“It’s fine, sorry. It’s – it’s nothing.”

Mrs Forman chews on her bottom lips, wringing her hands together. “Oh, Stephanie, honey, let me – let me make you a hot chocolate, okay? You sit down.”

Hyde sits down in Red’s chair heavily, not up to fighting it. At some point, probably due to a few of his mom’s pointed looks, Forman mooches over and pats her twice on the shoulder. She lets out a strangled laugh.

“God, you’re bad at this,” she says. Forman slides into the chair next to her, but Hyde stays staring at the table. He pitches his voice low.

“Was it Jackie?”

Hyde hesitates. She’s too tired for introspection, but maybe it’s been ticking away at her subconscious for the last few hours, hidden under her rage. She _should_ be mad at Jackie. Jackie is — Jackie is the personification of all these crappy emotions she’s been feeling. _Jackie_ is the reason Hyde went to prison. _Jackie_ is the reason Hyde’s having to re-deal with all this sexuality crap, all this annoyance and pity and understanding making it so she can’t even be properly mad about it. _Jackie_ is the one who ditched her to go back to dating Kelso. Pathetic, cheating Kelso. Everything she’s feeling, all of it — every stinking bit — can be traced back to _Jackie_.

But. No. She’s not mad at her. It’s not even her _fault_. And somehow that’s worse.

Forman is still looking at her with his stupid bendy eyebrows, all caring and shit, and Hyde yields.

“Kelso,” she admits, kind of reluctantly. Her and Forman have been friends for years, but they’ve been friends with Kelso for almost as long. And they’re all close, but he and Forman probably have some weirdo shared ‘guy’ bond that she can’t compete with. Not that she wants to compete with it, exactly. And yeah, Forman’s been pretty good about everything else, but Hyde really doesn’t want to find out what would happen if she asked him to choose.

Forman’s eyebrows knit together. “Did he... Hyde, did he… do something, to you?”

She stares at him for a second, and then jolts, not really sure what he’s asking but knowing she doesn’t like it. “What? No! Jesus. He didn’t do anything. What the hell kind of thing is that to suggest?”

Forman squeaks, raising his hands up. “Look, I don’t know! You came in here crying! I haven’t seen you cry since Kelso’s dog bit you on the ass in second grade, I figured it was a big deal!”

Hyde huffs, and picks at her nails. “No, it was. It was stupid, forget it.”

Forman’s mouth twists downwards. “Okay. Hey, uh, Hyde? Don’t hit me for this, but you know you’re my best friend, right?”

Hyde blinks. “Oh,” she says. “I mean, uh. Sure. Okay. I guess, you know. Same.”

She shrugs, and Forman reaches out to clap her shoulder again. “Okay. Cool. Good to know.”

He gives her a sappy smile. It weirdly makes her feel better.

“You’re such a nerd,” she sniffs. “Go get me my hot chocolate.”

“So _demanding_.”

**vi.**

Jackie cheats on Kelso. Hyde doesn’t care, except for where she wishes Jackie had just kissed her instead of her sleazy boss. But when she comes down to the basement, searching furiously for Kelso to apologise, she stops like a light in front of Hyde, mouth falling open and looking like a frightened rabbit.

“I didn’t mean to,” she blurts desperately. “God, I didn’t, I was just so upset because Michael’d forgotten me _again_ , and ever since prom I’ve been up and down and I don’t know what I _want_ and I swear, I swear I didn’t mean to kiss him, and — oh, you probably hate me too! I’ve ruined everything!”

Hyde’s chest hurts. Jackie is literally so bad for her self-defences, what with the way she makes Hyde want to throw herself on grenades if it’ll keep them from hurting her. Without thinking, Hyde reaches out to her, curling her hand around Jackie’s bicep.

“Jackie,” she says, ducking down into her line of vision. “Doll. I’m on your side.”

Jackie’s mouth gapes even wider, her eyes filled with tears. “Oh, Stephanie,” she cries, and buries herself in Hyde’s arms. “I’m so sorry!”

And Hyde thinks, maybe, that she knows what Jackie means. That maybe they’re finally getting somewhere. Maybe she’ll give it all one last chance.

***

Hyde resolutely doesn’t watch the fight when it happens, turning her back on the both of them even though it’s kind of their fault for electing to have it in the basement. Still. Hyde would hate to have this kind of fight with someone in front of witnesses, so she gives Jackie what little dignity she can, considering that nobody else seems to share Hyde’s opinion, and is watching it unfold.

“You used to cheat on me all the time!”

Of course, the downside is that listening to it makes Hyde want to shove anything, even disco, into her ears so she doesn’t have to hear it anymore. She didn’t realise she was still so angry at Kelso about the prom — her foot is tapping like crazy, like a ticking time bomb until she snaps.

“But Jackie,” says Kelso, and Hyde taps with greater force, imagining it’s his face under her boot. “You cheated out of hate, I cheated out of love. I want to forgive you, but I have all this pent up rage that I —”

Hyde goes still. It’s like freakin’ Chip all over again.

“For _fuck's_ sake,” she says loudly, loud enough that it cuts Kelso off. She doesn’t even register getting up, but suddenly she’s pushing at Kelso’s shoulder, forcibly getting him away from Jackie and shoving herself between them.

“You need to learn to lay off, Kelso,” she hears herself say. Jackie says her name, but it’s like ringing in her ears. She’s so _mad._

“You cheated on Jackie like a bazillion times, and you never owned up for it, not even when you got caught. Not only did Jackie fess up, but she only kissed a guy. You slept with women for months behind her back.” She shoves Kelso in the chest. “So why don’t you quit buggin’ her and get. A little. Damn. Perspective.”

She punctuates each word with a shove, until Kelso is backed up against the wall.

“Jackie!” he says, like a plea for help, and at least he knows that Hyde could kick his ass. But speaking of. Hyde looks back at her, standing stock-still by the washing machine, and cocks an eyebrow at her. _Come on_ , she wants to say, _let him have it. He deserves it._

Jackie stares back at her for a long moment. She looks — now isn’t really the time, but she looks _good_. She looks less like the girl who first forced herself into painting Hyde’s nails, with her double barrettes and rainbow sweaters, and more like somebody who’s known a few hardships. Maybe it was Kelso cheating on her, shattering that slightly naive ideal of love. Maybe it was getting a job. Hyde would like to say she had something to do it, but she isn’t quite self-centered enough to do so. But whatever it is, Hyde’s suddenly aware that Jackie’s _hot_. She knew she was pretty, she knew she was gorgeous, was _well_ aware that her smile did things to Hyde’s insides. It’s just that now she also wants Jackie to pin her to a wall. It’s pretty inconvenient.

Jackie’s hands twitch by her sides, pink nails flashing with the movement. _Yes_ , thinks Hyde triumphantly as she realises what’s going to happen, all other thoughts abruptly disappearing from her mind. Kelso is breathing heavily under Hyde’s arm, and she doesn’t know if he’s witnessing the same change in Jackie, but she hopes he is. Jackie’s composure snaps, and next thing Hyde knows she’s moving aside to let Jackie throttle Kelso by the collar as she yells her freakin’ lungs off, pleased as punch and _proud_.

“Stop smiling so much,” mutters Donna as they stand back to watch the fireworks (these ones are more to Hyde’s liking), wincing and groaning at the appropriate moments.

“Nah,” says Hyde, and just keeps on grinning.

**vii.**

Mrs Forman wants to throw her a party for her birthday. It’s her eighteenth, which is cool, because she’ll finally be able to buy beer. Less cool is the thought of everyone fawning over her for an afternoon. Red has to basically drag her by the ear across to the Pinciotti’s, but at least he grumbles his solidarity.

“Look, Stephanie,” he says, gruffly. “You know, Kitty loves a party. God knows she’s thrown me enough of them over the years. It’s just something you have to deal with in this family. Best to get it over with painlessly.”

“Oh,” says Hyde, and tucks a bit of hair behind her ear. Red claps her on the shoulder.

“Well,” he says, with what's probably his best approximation of a smile, “You’re a good kid.”

He gestures at the door to the Pinciotti’s living room with his thumb. “Open ‘er up.”

Hyde grimaces, but accepts that she’ll have to face the music at some point, and opens it. A loud chorus of _happy birthday_ s erupt at her, but in the end it’s only one that really matters.

“Happy birthday, Stephanie,” whispers Jackie, perched on her tiptoes, lips still half against Hyde’s cheek.

“Thanks,” she mumbles. At some point her hand’s comes up, naturally, to rest on Jackie’s waist. She’s close enough that if she tilted her head just right she could kiss her. Distantly she wonders if Jackie'll ever stop making her feel like an exploding supernova.

She doesn’t get a chance to talk to her properly until a half hour later, after Hyde’s opened presents and blown out eighteen candles. She’s admiring the _High St_ sign when Jackie comes to sit down on the couch next to her, tucking her legs up under her and smiling gleefully. She picks up the sweater from Mrs Forman and holds it out in front of her appraisingly.

“So this is cute,” she teases, and gives Hyde a sidelong look. The sweater in question is bright blue, and has _Stephanie_ weaved across the front. It’s only because of how much she loves Mrs Forman that Hyde had managed not to wince as she opened it. She figures she’ll wear it on Christmas and then never again. But she’s happy enough to play along, so she gives Jackie a lazy grin and repeats what Mrs Forman told her:

“It matches my eyes.”

Jackie bites her lip, eyes sparkling with mischief. “I’ll say. Don’t you want to try it on?”

Hyde sends her a look, but it’s dampened by the warmth worming it’s way into her from where Jackie’s knees are pressing against her legs. She reaches out to grab it back, tugging it into her lap. “Nah. I’m gonna wait til later.”

Jackie pouts. “What? No, put it on! We wanna see if it suits you!”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Oh, come on, don’t be a _baby_ —“

She starts trying to pull the sweater from Hyde, who finds herself tugging it back, but Jackie’s wily and twists and turns to stay out of Hyde’s grasp, the two of them rapidly dissolving into fighting dirty. She pokes Jackie under the ribs and Jackie yelps, but doesn’t let up her hold. “Hey, _no_ — Jackie!”

She laughs despite herself and Jackie seizes her advantage, moving to push the sweater forcibly over Hyde’s head. She bats her away desperately, actually _giggling_ , for God’s sake, and for a few seconds her world becomes an incomprehensible mess of limbs and blue wool as she wrestles with Jackie for the sweater.

“Man, _stop_ , you’re so annoyi—“

The sweater finds its way around Hyde’s neck and she breaks off, huffing. Jackie laughs, and fiddles with the way it’s sitting on Hyde’s shoulders.

“Oh, well, it certainly makes for a nice scarf,” she teases, and Hyde rolls her eyes. Somehow or other Jackie has ended up practically _in her lap_ , and she can tell Jackie realises this at the same time she does from the way her eyes widen. Hyde wonders if it will make it better or worse if she removes her hand from Jackie’s thigh.

“You girls,” laughs Mrs Forman from somewhere, and they jolt apart to opposite ends of the sofa. “Jackie, sweetie, if you want a sweater that badly I’ll make you your own for your birthday, there’s no need to fight for Stephanie’s.”

 _Ha!_ thinks Hyde, and sends Jackie a triumphant grin. _Serves you right_. But Jackie is still smiling when she looks up at Mrs Forman, though the corners are slightly softened, and when she speaks her voice comes out almost sincere.

“Thank you, Mrs Forman,” she says earnestly, still pink in the face. “I’d really like that.”

And _oh, shit_ , thinks Hyde. She’s freakin’ in love. With _Jackie_.

**viii.**

Shortly after this Kelso decides he wants to get Jackie back. Hyde nearly throws up.

It doesn’t matter that Jackie rejects all his suggestions of getting back together. Kelso just gets more and more enthusiastic, sure that this is another test. Sure that if he just finds the _right way_ of asking, that Jackie’ll take him back without a second thought. And worst of all is that he enlists _Hyde_ to help.

“I’ve got it!” he cries suddenly, and then bolts from the Hub, leaving her and Fez blinking in the dust. _Great_. He comes back overexcited and with a promise ring, babbling on about how Jackie’s going to come by and be so _overwhelmed_ by his declaration of love, and so _enamoured_ (seriously, Hyde didn’t even know he knew what these words meant) that she’ll have no _choice_ but to take him back.

Hyde hadn’t exactly wanted to be here when Jackie went gaga over it, but she also doesn’t really want to have to wait and hear about it second hand, so she forces herself to stick around. Jackie storms into the Hub while Hyde’s halfway through her pinball game, yelling about how this better be important and if it’s another attempt at winning her back he can stick it up his ass, which Hyde does smirk at even if it’s undercut by worry. There’s some fluff talk from Kelso, and then he gets down on his knee like it’s an actual proposal and not a dumb high school thing. Watching it all happen feels kind of like watching a car crash from inside the car.

“Jackie Burkhart,” says Kelso, eyes all wide and earnest. “Will you accept my promise ring?”

Hyde braces herself for the squeals, but they don’t come. Instead Jackie whacks Kelso hard in the shoulder.

“ _Michael_ ,” she snaps, indignant, and Hyde blinks. “For god’s sake, do you have _any_ idea — proposals are _sacred_ , Michael, how _dare_ you, haven’t you ever read _Cosmo_? Get up, you idiot!”

Kelso stands from where he’d toppled over under the force of her hit, looking confused. Hyde knows the feeling.

“I don’t understand,” he says, gesticulating wildly. “I bought you a ring! You’re supposed to take me back.”

Jackie points a finger threateningly at him, and Kelso cowers. “You have _sullied_ the name of _romance_ , Michael. I’m _not_ getting back together with you. _Ever_.”

“But,” starts Kelso, morosely, honestly. “I love you, Jackie.”

Hyde swallows, and looks at her feet. Because here’s the thing: Hyde likes Jackie. A lot. And Kelso frustrates her — she doesn’t like his behaviour, doesn’t like the way he constantly plays the victim, doesn’t like the way he never analyses his own actions. But he’s still, despite everything, one of her best friends. Whenever she feels like doing stupid shit, she goes to Kelso. Forman’s too uptight, and he’s not the kind of person to shove five firecrackers in a roast chicken just to see what happens. No one’s ever managed to make her laugh quite like Kelso has, and she likes that he doesn’t mind if she’s laughing at him. So even though he says stupid shit, and even though he does stupid shit, it’s not like she _wants_ to screw him over. And yet.

“But I don’t love you” says Jackie, softly, while Hyde’s stomach is curdling in on itself. Kelso’s head drops down.

“So you don’t accept my promise ring?”

Hyde can’t help looking up, because even though its a betrayal she wants Jackie _so much_ , and she doesn’t want to see them back together. Jackie locks eyes with her for a moment, and Hyde doesn’t believe in these sorts of things as a rule, but for a moment she thinks she finally understands what it must be like in Jackie’s cotton candy brain, and she thinks maybe Jackie even understands her, too.

“No, Michael,” says Jackie. “I’m sorry, I don’t.”

***

Kelso leaves and Fez follows, and suddenly it’s just her and Jackie, _alone_. Jackie is looking at her feet, face flushed, and fidgeting with the strap of her cross-body bag. She’s wearing a bright green shirt under her denim jumpsuit, the perfect match for Hyde’s nails. But it’s not deliberate. It _can’t_ have been deliberate. Not even if Jackie is exactly the sort of person to do it.

Hyde’s fingers twitch.

“So you turned him down, huh?” she finally manages, and Jackie nods. She juts her chin upwards, and looks Hyde dead in the eye.

“He’s not what I want anymore.”

Hyde swallows. Her nails dig into her palms.

“Let’s get out of here,” she says. “You eaten?”

Hyde swaps her keys with Jackie for a ten dollar bill, and lets her go warm the car up while she gets the burgers and a pop for herself, because she thinks she’s gonna need it with the way her throat feels all dry. She picks at her nail polish while she waits, and she sort of feels like she’s being arrested all over again. Or, no, not quite that, but the walk home when she knew the only thing waiting for her was Red’s inevitable anger, and the knowledge that she couldn’t run from it.

They drive to the lookout in silence. Jackie’s sending out a whole range of weird vibes, and Hyde doesn’t really want to assume that this evening is going one way when it’s actually the opposite, so she keeps her mouth firmly shut.

“Thank you,” says Jackie after she’s finished her burger, looking a lot less peaky and more like herself. They're sitting on the hood of the Camino, looking out across the town. Jackie huffs out a laugh, crumpling the wrapping in her left hand. “Tonight turned out to be nice.”

“We haven’t talked for thirty minutes,” points out Hyde, to be an asshole. Jackie just shrugs.

“We didn’t have to.”

Hyde swallows, because Jackie’s right and it’s freaky that a cheerleader knows her so well, that she knows Jackie so well, that somewhere along the line they’ve actually become pretty good friends and then some.

“Right,” she says, looking at her hands. “You holdin’ up okay?”

She catches Jackie smile out of the corner of her eye. “Yes. Thank you.”

“I didn’t do nothin’.”

Jackie keeps smiling, though it’s gone a little watery. “You did. You helped me. You — you became my friend even when you didn’t want to be, and you always told me that I could do better than Michael, and you made me realise it too. Stephanie, I think you were my first real friend.”

She waves a hand as if sensing that Hyde has some choice ideas about that, cutting her off before she even has a chance to speak. “Oh, I had Donna, and the cheerleading girls, but you really cared about me. Even though I annoyed you.”

“Still do,” mumbles Hyde, and Jackie gives her a soft grin.

“And I cared about you,” she says simply. “Even though you wear your silly tee-shirts and your flares are always dirty, and even though you ramble on and on about the government. Not to mention that apparently nobody ever taught you to use your words. Do you know how boring it is to talk to someone whose default responses are _whatever_ and _that’s cool_? You’re a very annoying person, Stephanie. But I like you anyway.”

She swings her legs a little, leaning back to look up at the sky. “You know I stayed with Michael because I thought that it couldn’t get better? All the cheerleading girls have been cheated on, at some point. I just assumed it was a guarantee. I didn’t realise it could be better — could _feel_ better until I hung around with you. I think I’d be happy to paint your nails for the rest of my life.”

Jackie says all of this matter-of-factly, like she’s relaying what Tiffany Jackson wore to school last Thursday and not rearranging the whole world under Hyde’s feet.

“Oh,” says Hyde, dumbly. She wants to tell Jackie, to tell her all of it, about how she’s been feeling some kind of way about her since the barbecue, maybe before. But Jackie’s right, she’s got two default responses and neither of them are appropriate here. Jackie tears her gaze from the stars, her eyes flicking over Hyde’s face.

“I don’t know if I’m like you,” she says as if she can read Hyde’s mind, can see the persistent seed of doubt that’s nestled in her chest. “Or something different. But I know I like girls.”

Jackie hesitates, her eyes wide and earnest. She leans closer. “I know I like you.”

Hyde might not be able to tell Jackie, and she might not be brave, but she can do this. She’s wanted to do it so long that it’s easy, instinctive, like flicking a lighter or throwing a punch. She tilts forward and Jackie meets her halfway, her palm falling softly on Hyde’s cheek. It's like... everything. It's beating some guy up in kindergarten for picking on the Forman kid. It's Donna, age six, holding out her hand and saying  _hey, wanna wrestle?_. The Formans' giving her a place to stay. Smoking up with Leo in the FotoHut. The feeling she got the first time she listened to _Zeppelin_ and thought  _hey, this is it_. But mostly it's just Jackie — Jackie, wide-eyed and eager, dragging her by the hand into her bedroom, Hyde's boots leaving dirty footprints on the pink carpet, and settling down to paint her nails. 

It's belonging.

Hyde kisses Jackie slowly, softly, lets Jackie give as much as she takes. Her arm snakes around Jackie's waist, a gentle pressure, and it lingers as they break apart, breathing in each other's space.

“Huh,” mumbles Hyde, and feels a dizzying grin spread across her face. “So that’s something.”

Jackie beams, and strokes her thumb along Hyde’s cheekbone, pressing their foreheads together. “ _Stephanie_ ,” she says, breathless. "What now?"

Hyde doesn’t know what’s coming tomorrow, and she doesn’t really care, either. She’s used to living in uncertainty, and the only real difference is that now she's got something to keep. It’s weird to feel it with such a surety, especially given her and Jackie’s track record, but they’ve managed it so far and, frankly, it feels like they’re gonna be okay.

As if reading her mind, Jackie reaches out and places her hand gently above Hyde’s heart, because she’s sappy like that. _Christ_ , thinks Hyde, she’s in love with a _romantic_. Her reputation is _wrecked_.

“You tryna feel me up?” she jokes, and puts her hand over Jackie’s. Her nails, short and neon green, clash with Jackie’s red ones, but she doesn’t mind. It’s probably symbolic. Like, initially they don't look compatible, too bright and loud on their own to seem like they'd work together, but somehow come Christmas-time they just _fit_. “Because I gotta say, I’m not opposed to doing it.”

Jackie giggles, love-drunk, her fingers flexing under Hyde’s. “Take me home?”

Hyde smiles at her. “Anything for you, doll.”

And the funny thing is, she means it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> !!!! and we're done!! what!!! resisting the temptation not to post this until it was 100% polished almost killed me but here we finally are, i really hope you enjoyed the ride! some things:
> 
> 1\. ok so eek i do kind of feel like it got a bit too sappy at the end?? but i maintain that hyde is a goofball at heart and i think with female socialisation and a healthy dose of wlw-ness this isn’t totally ooc, so. idk like they're just in love ok and love conquers all
> 
> 2\. this ends with s4 but i MIGHT consider doing snippets of things from s5 (and onwards??? possibly??? when brainstorming i accidentally planned out their wedding so who knows how far it could go) if people are interested. let me know!
> 
> 3\. sorry it took me nearly a year to write this part??? especially since once i switched to hyde’s pov i wrote it in like three weeks. whoops. anyway, in that time deartangerine has written a 25k fic w both hyde and jackie as girls and i literally adore it so much and it inspired me to finish this so i HIGHLY recommend reading it. sylvia hyde is my dream woman and i love her
> 
> and thats that on that! thank you again to everyone who supported this fic, it meant so much to me especially as it was something that came very much from my heart!! just. BIG LOVE to you all!!!


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